Maverick. Iceman. Goose. Kenny Loggins. They all became household names in the 1980s thanks to a little movie called Top Gun. Produced by Don Simpson and Jerry Bruckheimer, Top Gun grossed an obscene amount of money by making the Navy look both totally cool and vaguely homoerotic. But decades later, when ace fighter pilots have been replaced by decidedly less cool unmanned aerial drones, is the highway to the danger zone closed for good? Bruckheimer doesn’t think so. In fact, he’s got the pedal to the floor and he’s speeding down the commuter lane with Top Gun 2 in his passenger seat.
It’s been almost a year since we’ve last seen assurances from Bruckheimer that Top Gun would in fact reappear to take our breaths away. Shortly thereafter we also got word from Val Kilmer that he’s all oiled up and ready to go. For those who had lost faith that the Iceman would cometh again, though, Bruckheimer has once again brought tidings of hope. In a chat with the Huffington Post, he let slip some plot details for the definitely-going-to-happen-at-some-point sequel.
“The concept is, basically, are the pilots obsolete because of drones,” Bruckheimer explained. “Cruise is going to show them that they’re not obsolete. They’re here to stay.”
Maverick versus an army of drones? Sounds like a recipe for intense aerial action. One of the stumbling blocks, apparently, is getting Tom Cruise on board for that action now that he’s flush with all that Jack Reacher money.
“It’s just getting to the starting place. Fortunately for Tom, he’s very busy, so you have to find a slot he can fit into and get a budget that Paramount feels they can make the picture.”
Hopefully Cruise can find the time in his busy schedule to make this happen, because the world is a darker place for not having Top Gun 2 in it. In the meantime, though, you can catch Cruise in Edge of Tomorrow, which will hit theaters on June 6th but probably won’t have “Danger Zone” in its soundtrack, so what’s the point?